TBV Insights

Videos for Inside Sales

A client of ours recently mentioned that their inside sales team would be thrilled to have a new video to share every week — but, of course, “we don’t have the budget for that.” Actually, if they — and you — have a video budget at all, you probably do have the budget to produce the right videos for inside sales.

What kind of videos does inside sales really need?

In an article titled “Inside Sales vs. Outside Sales,” Gabe Larsen of InsideSales.com asserts that there’s no versus about it: “It’s all sales.” InsideSales.com has data to back up this claim, including data on the increasing time spent selling remotely through social media, email, CRM, etc.

Time spent selling remotely
Inside Sales and Outside Sales both put in a lot time selling remotely. Different kinds of affordable video can lessen the burden, increase engagement, and improve the communication.

While there is apparently no factual basis to the assertion that a picture is worth a thousand words (or to AI pioneer John McCarthy’s corollary that 1,001 words are worth more than a picture), there’s no reason to doubt the universal experience that visuals — including video — can speed communication and improve understanding. But what kind of video is needed in these combined, and often protracted, remote selling efforts?

For one thing, the conversation needs to go beyond marketing messages and product information. An interesting finding in the Miller Heiman Group’s latest Sales Performance Study is that the companies who say they’re good at providing clients with insights and perspective win more sales.

Source: Miller Heiman Group, Selling in the Age of Ceaseless Change: 2018-2019 Sales Performance Study.

Video screen capture and personalization

When I asked sales maven Andy Paul about the use of video in protracted sales processes, he replied that “currently, I don’t see much being done in mid-to-late funnel video (other than Zoom for calls and CloudApp and similar apps for video and screen capture email.)”

That parenthetical “video and screen capture email” gave me pause. First of all, not everyone uses this kind of video. Some companies have never given it a thought. Secondly, screen capture apps like CloudApp represent a cheap, easy and highly usable solution to video personalization when you need to show instead of tell, and when you just need to put across your message in an engaging way.

The case for use-case video

Use-case videos for product demonstrations and tutorials Tech tips and how-to’s. Case studies. These categories — let’s call them “use cases” — invariably show up near the top in surveys of content preferences of IT decision-makers. A use-case video can

Videos to support your high-value offer

The High-Value Offer is a customer interaction with so much business value that the buyer feels compelled to engage. It’s an account-based marketing concept recommended by Gartner for customer acquisition, too. A high-value offer’s business value depends on timely topics